When Xia Yeliang was fired by Peking University this past fall, the Chinese economist and human-rights campaigner said his dismissal had been politically motivated. University officials denied the charge, saying that Mr. Xia was simply a poor teacher.
But an email obtained by The Chronicle and published below suggests that Mr. Xia’s political views may well have played a role in the decision to terminate his contract at the prestigious university.
The August message—sent to Mr. Xia by Zhang Zheng, the Communist Party secretary of the university’s School of Economics—does not mention the professor’s teaching or scholarship.
Instead, Mr. Zhang appears to warn Mr. Xia about expressing his political views. Specifically, Mr. Zhang notes the professor’s decision to sign an online petition in support of Xu Zhiyong, a prominent activist who recently was indicted in connection with his campaigns against corruption and for social change, including efforts to overturn discriminatory barriers in education and to demand that government officials publicly disclose their assets.
“This is not a thing that should be done by an instructor of Peking University,” writes Mr. Zhang, whose role, common at Chinese institutions, is as both a university administrator and a Communist Party official. “What were you thinking when you signed the petition?”
Mr. Xia, Mr. Zhang writes, should withdraw his name from the petition and “give written explanations regarding this issue.” He also urges Mr. Xia not to participate in future protests in support of Mr. Xu.
While at times Mr. Zhang, who takes a conversational tone, characterizes the email as his personal opinion, elsewhere he writes as “a colleague and a supervisor in charge.” And although he never explicitly links Mr. Xia’s activism to a coming faculty vote on his appointment, Mr. Zhang concludes the message by reminding him of that pending decision. Two months later, the faculty voted to dismiss Mr. Xia.
A Classroom Lesson
In the email, Mr. Zhang refers to the professor as a member of the Communist Party, though Mr. Xia says he resigned from the party in 2008, the same year he signed Charter 08, a statement that called for democratic freedoms and human rights in China.
Although the professor, who taught at Peking for more than a decade, has maintained he was dismissed for his outspokenness, university officials have said that he was let go for academic reasons and that he had been the subject of frequent student complaints. Indeed, some of his former students have told reporters he was a poor teacher who spent class time talking about his political views, not following the curriculum.
Mr. Xia’s firing came amid concerns over a possible crackdown on academic and journalistic freedoms in China and has led some American faculty members to question whether their colleges should have ties with universities in authoritarian nations.
Beginning this month, Mr. Xia will be a visiting associate at the Freedom Project at Wellesley College; some faculty members at the liberal-arts college in Massachusetts have been among his most vocal advocates. Mr. Xia also will hold a permanent appointment at an as-yet-unnamed American research institution.
Following is an English version of Mr. Zhang’s email, translated from the Chinese.
Read the Email
To view this message in full screen for easier reading, click here.
